E.ON to invest €3 billion in renewables

London, 2 August: E.ON is to expand its renewable energy activities, investing €3 billion ($4.1 billion) by 2010, mainly in offshore wind, it announced on Tuesday. This is up from €1 billion ($1.4 billion) in last year's investment plan.

By 2010, the Germany-based utility company aims to commission more than 500MW of new capacity, more than doubling its existing installed capacity of approximately 400MW.

A new business will be established to manage all of its renewable energy activities, as well as E.ON's long-term sourcing of carbon credits to help it meet its targets under the EU Emissions Trading Scheme.

The future renewables and climate protection unit will be headed by Frank Mastiaux, who is currently responsible for BP's global liquefied petroleum gas business in London.

"We believe that by bringing the group's expertise together in one unit, we can execute this investment plan more swiftly and effectively by making more efficient use of the resources we have in the E.ON Group," said Sabine Hower, spokeswoman for E.ON.

She did not specify in which countries E.ON plans to build renewable capacity, except that it would target markets with "significant growth potential" and an "attractive and stable incentive system".

One of the offshore wind power projects planned by E.ON will be among the largest wind farms in the world – the London Array in the Thames estuary – with a capacity of about 1,000 MW and which E.ON is developing with Shell WindEnergy and Denmark's DONG Energy.

The new unit, which is expected to be operational by the beginning of 2008, will play a key role in achieving E.ON's target of halving its carbon dioxide emissions from 1990 levels by 2030, reducing the carbon intensity of its power generation portfolio to 0.36 tonnes/MWh.